(1) Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a monitoring device which monitors moving objects that are moving such as persons and vehicles or a crowd.
(2) Description of the Related Art
A device shown in FIG. 1 is known as a conventional monitoring device (refer to Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 11-399139). As shown in FIG. 1, this conventional monitoring device 10 includes an image-capturing device 11, a part location extraction unit 12, a shape characteristic extraction unit 13, a part location tracking unit 14, a motion characteristic measurement unit 15, a comparison search unit 16 and a display unit 17.
As shown in FIG. 1, in the conventional monitoring device 10, the part location extraction unit 12 extracts a part location of a person; the shape characteristic extraction unit 13 extracts a characteristic of a shape; the part location tracking unit 14 tracks the extracted part location; and the motion characteristic measurement unit 15 measures a characteristic of a motion. The conventional monitoring device 10 automatically extracts characteristics of a person in a monitored region and compiled into a computer database, while it searches for, examines and tracks a candidate having specific characteristics and identifies a suspicious person by bringing attention to a surveillant.
Also, another conventional monitoring device is disclosed in Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 2000-163600. This another conventional monitoring device extracts a skin color and a motion of an object captured by the image-capturing device, automatically selects and tracks the most appropriate object to be tracked, captures an image of a face part of the object, and identifies an individual by analyzing the captured face image. Further, the monitoring device identifies, from the face part information, a mask, a pair of sunglasses, a hat and the like so as to determine the object as a dangerous person.
However, with the current technology, it is difficult for the conventional monitoring devices to completely automate, in the case of detecting a person and matching the characteristics of the person with information stored in a database, the process of matching, particularly with a large amount of accumulated information in the database. Also, in the case where there are images of persons in an overall picture or where occlusion occurs, it is difficult for the conventional monitoring devices to precisely specify a part location and extract a face image. Therefore, if the process of detecting and tracking a person and matching the characteristics of the person with the large amount information in the database is completely automated, there are problems of causing detection miss, tracking miss and matching miss which may be obstacles to determining a current situation as an abnormal state.